sked leave to pay his addresses to the daughter. Mrs.
Austin already loved him like a son, she was but too glad to give him
her consent; Mr. Austin reserved the right to inquire into his
character; from neither was there a word about his prospects, by neither
was his income mentioned. "Are these people," he wrote, struck with
wonder at this dignified disinterestedness, "are these people the same
as other people?" It was not till he was armed with this permission that
Miss Austin even suspected the nature of his hopes: so strong, in this
unmannerly boy, was the principle of true courtesy; so powerful, in this
impetuous nature, the springs of self-repression. And yet a boy he was;
a boy in heart and mind; and it was with a boy's chivalry and frankness
that he won his wife. His conduct was a model of honour, hardly of tact;
to conceal love from the loved one, to court her parents, to be silent
and discreet till these are won, and then without preparation to
approach the lady--these are not arts that I would recommend for
imitation. They lead to final refusal. Nothing saved Fleeming from that
fate, but one circumstance that cannot be counted upon--the hearty
favour of the mother, and one gift that is inimitable and that never
failed him throughout life, the gift of a nature essentially noble and
outspoken. A happy and high-minded anger flashed through his despair: it
won for him his wife.

Nearly two years passed before it was possible to marry: two years of
activity--now in London; now at Birkenhead, fitting out ships, inventing
new machinery for new purposes, and dipping into electrical experiment;
now in the _Elba_ on his first telegraph cruise between Sardinia and
Algiers: a busy and delightful period of bounding ardour, incessant
toil, growing hope and fresh interests, with behind and through all the
image of his beloved. A few extracts from his correspondence with his
betrothed will give the note of these truly joyous years. "My profession
gives me all the excitement and interest I ever hope for, but the sorry
jade is obviously jealous of you."--"'Poor Fleeming,' in spite of wet,
cold, and wind, clambering over moist, tarry slips, wandering among
pools of slush in waste places inhabited by wandering locomotives, grows
visibly stronger, has dismissed his office cough and cured his
toothache."--"The whole of the paying out and lifting machinery must be
designed and ordered in two or three days, and I am half crazy with